


Perch

by phoenixjustice



Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types
Genre: M/M, Trans Joker (DCU), batjokes in a nutshell, but nothing too explicit, mentions of some derogatory language aimed at LGBT people, rooftops and angst, the people who said the bad things got the crap beat out of them off screen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-20
Updated: 2020-10-20
Packaged: 2021-03-09 04:29:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,012
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27118234
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/phoenixjustice/pseuds/phoenixjustice
Summary: A Batman/Joker fic set sometime post-New 52?Trust, he had learned, went a long way. It hadn’t always been easy. And in many ways it still wasn’t easy for him, but there had also been a happiness as much as the other emotions in trusting somebody.
Relationships: Joker (DCU)/Bruce Wayne
Comments: 2
Kudos: 49





	Perch

**Author's Note:**

> For Zak!
> 
> I hope you like this!! :D

Perch

By: PhoenixJustice

Batman/Joker fic set sometime post New 52?

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The air was brisk, a sharp chill, the city starting to set into its Autumn patterns, though he scarcely notices such a thing (save for the tiny alert the system in his suit gave him, keeping him up to date on many things; current weather, later weather, radio signals, police frequencies, news...he kept up to date on as much as he possibly could-though Alfred had often told him he took on too much-feeling it his strong _duty_ to the city he loved so well, the city he had spent his entire adult life trying to help.)

Sometimes nights were like this for him, getting into a zone where the backdrop noise of the city felt like it flowed through him, making him feel truly one with the city that he loved so much, the sounds giving his body-which wanted to tire as the hours of work dragged on and on and on-energy, life.

He swoops down, cape spread out wide. It wasn't often he went for a dive with one of his specially made capes, but the feeling in the air of tonight felt... _different._ Things were as difficult as always in certain areas, but there was also an air that didn't often happen in the city, but was one which was one of the main things that kept him going, kept him fighting.

It felt like _hope._

He couldn't explain it, but maybe he didn't need to. To him it was as simple as breathing.

He eventually finds purchase on a rooftop, one of the tall-ish brick buildings, crumbling from age, deep in the Narrows. The red brick was faded, nearly pink from age, showing the wear and tear not just from age but from the roughness of the city itself. But he loved it. It gave it character. It was the little things like this which gave him more appreciation and love for his city (not that he was opposed to repairing and giving to the city. He did such, in many ways. But he could still also admire the past as well.)

He stands there for a moment, letting out a breath. It wasn't often he could take the time to just _breathe,_ to take things in without having to rush off immediately to the next thing. That would come of course, it always did, but with others in the city right now (Nightwing, Red Hood, Orphan, Spoiler, Oracle…) he could take at least _one_ moment and know that his city was still in good hands even while they weren't in his.

Trust, he had learned, went a long way. It hadn't always been easy. And in many ways it _still_ wasn't easy for him, but there had also been a happiness as much as the other emotions in trusting somebody.

His moment alone upon the rooftop is quickly changed up though, with a bang of the rooftop door and out comes a running person.

Who quickly stops as soon as he sees him.

Of all places in the city, of all times, as large as Gotham City was…

And he and Joker still find a way to meet.

He'd have said that Joker had found-in one of his many ways-of finding Bruce (he had an uncanny knack for it that even superpowered people did not) but the expression on his face tells him otherwise. He looks surprised and...what else was in those deep green eyes of his?

"Bats!" Joker's eyes are wide in his face. "If I knew you were waiting on little ol' me, I would have spruced up more!"

He laughs a moment later, but it feels forced, even to Bruce's ears from the distance between them.

"What are you doing here?" He asks him. Most likely he was up to no good, but there were a few occasions when it was something surprisingly innocuous; The Joker lived to throw people off, after all.

Joker shrugs a shoulder, his lanky body moving slowly up to him (not from anything... _extraneous,_ as was often his usual thing, but he seemed...hurt?)

"Well! It's my...what time is it?"

"4 am."

"It's my daily 4am run, of course!" Joker lets out another forced laugh, eyes unusually not meeting Bruce's. "Have to do _something_ to keep this trim a figure, darling! Not all of us have your vast... _wealth_ at their disposal."

He wags his eyebrows at Bruce, seeming more like himself in that moment, making Bruce have to hold back the unusual urge to roll his eyes at Joker, but feeling a relief he can't quite deny to himself at Joker seeming to start to bounce back from whatever was currently-or had been-troubling him.

And this past little while with the two of them...well even Bruce could only deny _so_ many things, even to himself. Especially given that he had been _giving in_ to Joker. Not when it came to his city, never that, but in things more personal…

At first Bruce had felt it a personal failing, but even that, he had realized, was just hiding the fact that he _wanted_ Joker.

There was all of these things between them, that had been there since the literal beginning, when he had been but a punk kid trying to save a dying city, before he had even found the symbol for his Mission and Joker had been a Red Hooded man in a classy suit, talking about changing the world.

"And?" He asks.

"And what?"

"And what else were you doing?" He asks patiently.

Joker looks at him for a moment, before moving past him, closer to the lip of the roof, where the raised bit of concrete that ran around it was, outstretching his arms as he looked out at the city.

"What I always do; make a statement!" Joker exclaims. "A little bit of this-"

"Joker."

"-a little bit of that-"

" _Joker."_

"And a little bit of, well, I blush even to _say_ it in front of you, my sweet."

"J."

Joker visibly stills. It wasn't often that he called him by the name. His shoulders slump.

"What?" Joker whispers. "What do you want to know? Why does it _matter?_ You usually come to your own conclusions, don't you? And you, my dear, are often right or more right than you think. So just…"

He steps forward, standing right behind him, placing hesitant gloved hands on his shoulders. Joker flinches but does not move away. He seemed sensitive about Bruce touching him, for all that he had asked for it over the years, _begging_ for it at times.

"What's wrong?" He asks, his tone quieting as much as Joker's had.

Joker lets out a choked sound at that.

"Of all the times to show you _care._ Why _now?"_ Despite it being a question, it seemed rhetorical and aimed at himself, rather than at Bruce.

Care. _That_ was a word that made him swallow against a lump in his throat, that was for certain. To feel things like that for Joker was one thing (and that one thing had been a revelation in and of itself.) To _admit_ as such was another beast entirely…

"If you're hurt and need help with something-"

Joker lets out a self deprecating laugh.

"And you'd _help?_ Oh, darling, you remain as _yourself_ as ever."

Whatever _that_ meant.

He shrugs off Bruce's hands, taking another step to the lip of the roof. Bruce comes to stand beside him. It's silent for awhile, as Bruce waits patiently for Joker to speak again (it wasn't usual for Joker to be so quiet, but it wasn't unheard of either.) Eventually he does.

"What do you know about the Purple District?"

The sudden question gives him a brief moment of pause. The 'Purple District' wasn't an official district in the city by any means but it was the unofficial area that people of the LGBT+ community had taken, with most businesses, restaurants, bars, and the like being run-and mostly catered to-LGBT+ people.

That in of itself wasn't unusual. Cities all over the country did similar things after all; gay bars, Drag Queen bars, things of that nature. But what made the Purple District different was two fold; It was looked over and protected by Hero _and_ Villain (or anti-hero, whatever your flavor) alike and they considered it Neutral territory. No fighting could occur by Villain, Hero (or Anti-Hero).

So that also meant that any Mafia that might try and run shops there were severely limited. It was the one district in the city where Heroes and Villains kept their words equally, keeping it a place for people to be free, themselves, in a way they might not be able to elsewhere.

"Did something happen?"

He usually didn't have to sweep over the district as much as other places in the City-though he still did rounds there anyway-as it was looked over by many others (such as Oswald Cobblepot's backing it financially and people like Harley Quinn looking over the entertainment districts, though he knew Joker also had some hand in that as well) but if something had happened…

"A couple little gay bashers who thought they were _funny,"_ Joker snarls. "If it hadn't been in the Purple, I would have gutted them like fish."

And of course a drawback to places of refuge for those who needed it and deserved it, sadly, was in the hatemongers who wanted to make those, who just wanted to live their lives, suffer.

"Nothing _physical_ of course, from them." Joker says, looking away, anger in his face, in his eyes, as if lighting the green from within with fire. "But enough to be _cute,_ they thought. And then once I left the Purple, I came across them again…"

Disappointment pools in his belly.

"You killed them?"

Joker glances back at him and laughs again, that self deprecating laugh.

"Oh darling, I wish I _had._ But no, they had a truckload (literally a truckload. Dunno where they hid a truck that big and ugly in the District) of people and even I, as good as _I_ am, can be taken by surprise. They gave a bit of a scuffle and I used my not so small skills and got away!"

He spreads his arms out again briefly, ironically.

"And here I am! Only...somehow you're here too."

"I just stopped here."

"A break? From _you?_ Have I or the both of us ended up in one of Mister Mxyzptlk's gigs again? They're usually such _fun!"_ Joker's mouth moves into a pout. "But I'm not in the mood right now."

"Well," Joker says, before Bruce can say anything, giving him a side glance. " _Some_ things I'm always in the mood for."

Such a corny line shouldn't get his heart racing as much as it did. But Joker always had a way with words. Whether more direct and to the point, with a tinge of arrogance, as Red Hood One, or more coy and seductive as The Joker-at least to him-Joker was a wordsmith that few could measure, even if he didn't always get as much credit for it.

"I'm still busy." He says, but the weakness is there, it's always there, deep within him, when it comes to The Joker.

"And I'm still here." Joker says. But then he glances away again, making Bruce's brows furrow beneath the mask. What was troubling him so?

"You said a scuffle...what did they do?"

Now that he looked closer, it looked as though Joker's clothes were torn, cut in places, a few shallow cuts against his white skin that he could make out that looked as though they had already stopped bleeding. He starts to reach forward without thinking and is startled as Joker slaps his hand away.

He looks up at him in surprise and surprise is also on Joker's face, briefly, before his expression shutters.

"I'm fine, Bats. I've been through much worse before. _You_ know that, first hand." He did, but that didn't mean it always made the experience any better. Certainly it often felt _worse…_

"Just let me."

He wasn't sure why he was so insistent. Maybe it was Joker's need to try and hide something from him. Despite how they often played on opposite sides (which was largely by Joker's choice and something that was a constant debate between them), there was still usually an open channel between them. And just because the lines had become a bit more blurred as of late, with their late night rendezvous, reminding him now keenly of the feel of Joker's lips, didn't mean that he had suddenly lost the ability to read Joker.

Something was bothering him greatly. And it didn't take a master of his craft in deduction to deduce such a thing.

" _No,_ Bruce."

 _That_ startles him. It was so secret to Joker about Bruce's true identity underneath the cowl and cape, but he didn't usually speak such aloud (complained it 'ruined the illusion' sometimes.)

"I can't do anything if you don't let me." He says in a calm tone.

"Maybe I don't _want_ your help." Joker spits out. "I've done just fine on my own up until now."

"J-"

"Don't." Joker's expression shutters. "Not now. Not that."

"Why?"

He looks up at Bruce and briefly the fire is back.

"Why? You want to know, Bruce? Why those limp dicks kept at me? This is why."

He yanks open his jacket, leaving him bare skinned to Bruce. The same pale skin. Other than some more cuts nothing seemed different… But then he starts to pull at his chest and Bruce is startled to see that it is an elaborate sort of thing on his chest, revealing… breasts.

" _Fag_ was one of their favorite words. But the stuff they liked to call me best, well, even _I_ won't subject you to those things." Joker says. He puts the chest binder back in place and turns away from him, moving to sit on the lip of the rooftop.

He looks at Joker's form for a moment, stunned. All of this time. He hadn't known…

He comes to sit next to him, on his right. Joker looks up at him and looking at him closer, Bruce is startled to see the film of tears in his eyes.

"So go ahead." Joker says roughly. "Call me a _freak._ Say that I'm-"

"Why would I ever do that?"

That stops Joker.

"Do you think such a thing would turn me away? Would disgust me?" He shakes his head. "Everyone has their own reasons for doing things. I could never be disgusted by you, Joker. Not because of that. If you didn't want to tell me, then you had your reasons for doing so. But, Joker…"

Joker leans in a bit as he leans in closer to him.

"You are just as much a man to me as you were moments before. The same man whose lips I know the taste of now."

Joker glances away, though this time it almost seems like he was blushing, if his body could have done so. His hands move continuously in his lap, his legs kicking against the brick.

"You have a way with words, Bruce Wayne." Joker says hoarsely.

"Well," He says lightly. "I don't want you to think you're the only man in Gotham who knows how to use words in just the right way either."

It's quiet for a moment. Then Joker speaks again.

"That's why I didn't…" He says quietly. "I didn't want you to touch me before."

Before Joker had been keen-very keen-on the kisses they shared, but had been very hesitant about any exploratory touches Bruce had wanted to make, keeping him at bay-and now he knew why.

"And now?"

Joker shrugs a bit, though it seems like it's because of _shyness_ of all things, which is a description he never would have put forth for the man.

"I'd...like to...try more. Sometime." Joker peeks at him from beneath beautiful green lashes. "Soon."

"Well I'll have to clear my calendar-"

"I'll buy you a new one."

"-and cancel with the Shelby twins."

"You wouldn't want them anyway. One of them voted _Republican._ Ick. Plus I'm _much_ more bendy."

"And pick out a good place for a date."

That seems to draw Joker short.

"A date?" He says faintly.

Bruce smiles.

"Well, I've never officially dated a man before, but I figured it would be a bit more _proper_ if we had a date before we went to bed."

He leans in even closer, touching Joker's face.

"Or do you not want a date?"

Joker's eyes widen.

"A _date?"_ Joker repeats. He nods rapidly. "Yes! I mean...fuck, Bruce, I didn't expect any of this. I-I mean what will I _wear?_ What if I want to wear a dress? Or a tux! Or maybe those suspenders I got off Hillbilly Bob for four for a dollar…"

"We can always pick you up something."

Joker stands up and Bruce follows him, bemusedly, though he can't help but smile at seeing his spirits livening up again.

"Ooh, sounds _spicy._ Does this mean you're my new sugar daddy?"

" _No."_ He says firmly.

Joker pouts. "You're no fun."

"That's what I have you for."

That stops Joker mid sentence and the look on his face makes Bruce want to blush-something he hadn't done in years.

"Fine." Joker finally says. He links arms with Bruce as they start to head out the way Joker had come. "But I still reserve the right to call you my sweet Brucey."

"No."

"My sweet little sugar plum?"

"No."

"My delicious cherry pie?"

" _No."_

"My double layered chocolate cake with extra sprinkles?"

"I-what. No. Wait, are you just naming foods you like now?"

"What about Broocey-Woocey?"

" _Fuck no_."

"Oh _my!_ Such _language,_ Mr. Wayne! Whatever will-"

He shuts Joker up with a kiss.

They linger that way for a long, long moment, just as the sun starts to peek through the clouds in the sky, illuminating the day.

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End file.
